Any Advice on Making Your Own Baby Food?

I made most of my girl's baby food.

I used a book called "Super Baby Food". if you google it, the web site will come up.

I did not make my own baby food for my kids, but I recently bought a potato ricer to make mashed potatoes. There was information with the ricer about making your own baby food any how easy it would be with the ricer. It looks like a giant sized garlic press. If I had it when my children were babies I probably would have tried using it. Good luck.

I know I am coming in late here, but I just wanted to add a couple more books you can look into.
The Baby Bistro Cookbook by Joohee Muromcew
and
First Meals by Annabel Karmel
I have both of these and they are great.
Also www.wholesomebabyfood.com is a great website to use.
I have so enjoyed making my own baby food. It is so much tastier and better for them :)

We made all of our son’s baby food. I work full-time outside of the home, but really wanted to try it and after a couple of batches, I convinced my husband that it was pretty easy and he pitched in.
We would spend 2-3 hours on a Saturday or Sunday and do enough food for a whole month. We would prepare the food, steam it, blend it and pack it into ice cube trays for freezing. Then the next day after the food was frozen, I broke the cubes into a freezer bag, labeled it and stored them in the freezer. When I was ready to use the food, I would heat it up in a glass bowl and feed it to our little one. EAch cube is about 1 oz. One of the things that I was worried about was that it would be difficult to travel with the food, but it was so easy. I would put 2-3 frozen cubes in a Tupperware dish and stick it in a small bag. If we were going to be eating soon, I would heat it up and go. If we were going to be eating later, by the time we were ready the food was thawed.

I got a lot of my information about making different foods on the web. One of my favorite websites is: http://www.wholesomebabyfood.com
I just printed out all of the information from the website and put the pages in a three-ring binder. I had my own baby cook book for almost free, and all of the directions that they provided really worked. The site also has a chart for introducing solid foods that was so helpful to me. The chart provides foods to try at each stage and then in other sections of the website it describes exactly how to prepare each food. The chart is at:
http://www.wholesomebabyfood.com/extras/SolidFoodsChart_W...

As far as the tools that we used:
I used the Sunbeam Food Steamer to steam all of my veggies and fruit. I found one on the web at http://www.sunbeam.com.au/products/product_details.cfm?re.... My steamer was not as elaborate and was only $35, but it seems like they have upgraded. I could see how the different trays could help (we only have one) because you could steam more than one thing at a time. You don’t even need a steamer though, you can just put the veggies or fruit in a pot with water and steam them that way. I do that sometimes if I want to steam two different things at one time. We also used the oven when suggested by the recipe, for instance for sweet potatoes and squash.

When I first started, I ordered the KidCo Babysteps complete natural feeding system. I really used the KidCo Baby Steps Food Mill. This was useful for smaller items or quick mashing (I have never used the carrying case). They also have a book, but I really used the on-line information more. I found the other baby products they offered to be rather useless. The Electric Food mill broke after two times and a regular blender worked way better. The Freezer trays cracked and did not fit enough food anyways. Plain old ice cube trays worked way better for us and way cheaper as well.
http://www.kidco.com/main.taf?p=2

I also got the Bella Cucina from Macy’s. It was cheaper than the Magic Bullet. http://www1.macys.com/catalog/product/index.ognc?ID=20252... I have really liked it, it was nice for fruits, smoothies and softer veggies. Sometimes, I would use that to mash up what we were having for dinner and it was ready in 5 minutes.
The magic bullet is now on sale at Macy’s also. http://www1.macys.com/search/index.ognc?SearchTarget=*&am...

One thing that was not in the book, but that our son loved was soybeans. We would steam them in the steamer, blend them up, add water and freeze. They are one of his favorite foods and lots of protein. I am glad we tried them.

One more note, my doctor did tell us to stay away from certain homemade foods until after a year. We needed to stay away from carrots because of high levels of nitrates. The doctor said that the carrot baby food was OK, because they only get the carrots from low nitrate farms. I just waited until after a year to do the carrots and our son loves them now. I can’t remember what else the doctor told us to avoid.

Sorry this is so long, I wanted to provide you with all the information I had, I hope the information is helpful. I really enjoyed preparing our son's food and it smelled so good. Good luck. Feel free to ask me any questions directly.

I made my own. I had twins and it was much easier and cheaper than I ever thought. I just purchased food, such as peas without salt and drained the juice into a cup in case I needed it. I put them in a food processor and mushed! Once it was mushed, I put it in ice cube trays and froze. Once they were frozen, I put them in a ziplock bag and labeled them. One cube was pretty close to one stage 1 jar. As they got older, I increased it, but it was easier than I thought. If we went anywhere, they have the disposable bowls (just in case we forgot it) that are seperated so that worked well. The only one I did not do myself was carrots. I heard that in the process of making the food, vitamins they need could be lost...so I just purchased that one. Good luck.

I think the easiest way is to just take the food that you are eating and process it in a magic bullet. There are two blades, one for chopping and one to make it smooth. It doesn't take a lot of space on the counter, it's easy to clean etc. You can take the food before you add spices and salt. But personally I never worried about all that for my kids. We eat very healthy as a rule so I didn't worry about a little salt and spice. I don't eat really spicy foods anyway.

If you do it this way, it will be fresh and you won't need space in your freezer to save anything. It truly only takes seconds to do it. For soups take it out with a slotted spoon so you won't get all the broth of course.

Suzi

I made my own for three of my children and it was supper easy and saved a ton of money. I just bought frozen veggies; cooked them; used my blender to make them really thin (I don't think I had to add any water...but maybe I did...my youngest is four and I have no brain sometimes...so I don't know what I did). I used ice cube trays and filled them with the food; froze them in little cubes then put them in ziplocks in the freezer. One bag with green bean cubes, one with pea cubes, etc. I would take the cubes out and in a bowl in the microwave for a few and they were ready. You might look at the library; I bet they have a book or several books with lots of recipes. Have fun. C.

You go girl! I am always impressed when people take on the challenge of making their own baby food. I made a little bit with my first child, but found it took a lot of time. Check out the book Super Baby Food. I just got it from the library and found it to offer good ideas. Good luck!

I made baby food for my second son. One at a time I baked butternut squash, boiled frozen green beans, boiled sweet potatoes, boiled carrots and put each of those items through my bleder while adding water enough to make it the right consistancy for a baby. I also made applesauce and pears following the applesauce recipe in a cookbook without the sugar and spices. I cooked red legumes also. Then with each step I froze the finished producted in ice cube trays and then when frozen transfered 2-3 cubes in individual baggies for easy servings. I managed to make enough in one day to cover the three - four months he ate smooth baby food. When he got bigger I used a baby food mill to mash up what we were eating for dinner.

I also looked through all the babyfood books at the library and at borders.

The one thing I can tell you is that the homemade baby foods tasted so much better!

I made baby food for my 2nd son. My sister came over and we spent the afternoon in the kitchen and had a ball! It was very easy. I just steamed or cooked the food that we normally eat without salt or spices. I used my a big food processor and my little handheld one that looks like a long fat stick with blades on the bottom. (That little baby is worth it's weight in gold if your going to do babyfood!) After we processed them to the right consistancy, we put them in those little ziplock snack bags and put them in the freezer. They were just the right size and equivalent to a jar of food. That afternoon, we cooked up veggies, chicken, beef and fruit. It was really easy, we had fun, and by the end of the afternoon, I had enough baby food to last until he started eating mashed food off of my plate. I saved so much money doing it that way. No telling how much money you could save now... I did that almost 14 years ago! Have fun!